


Exorcism

by gaudior



Series: Mercy of the Fallen [1]
Category: Yami No Matsuei
Genre: Case Fic, F/M, Ghosts, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 23:23:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 4
Words: 16,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/919251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gaudior/pseuds/gaudior
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A deserted mountain and a restless ghost are almost enough to distract Hisoka from the question: Now that I’ve asked him to live just for me-- what do I do with him?</p><p>Set immediately after the end of the anime.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Hisoka hated dreaming.  
  
Not while he dreamt, of course. The dreams set their own rules, and he couldn’t tell the difference between them and rationality. It seemed perfectly natural that he should be wearing his paper-cheap hospital gown in the Ju-oh-cho offices. It seemed perfectly natural that they had been waiting for Chief Konoe's arrival for so many weeks that snow had fallen high enough to press in at the windows. “Like cherry blossoms,” Tsuzuki said, pressing his hand against the meeting-room window in return.  
  
Hisoka rolled his eyes. “You wouldn’t think about food so much if you’d ever had enough,” he said.   
  
Tsuzuki’s hand clenched around the window pane, which shattered, and Hisoka tried hard not to jump. It was important not to show a reaction, not to let anyone see what he was thinking. I thought I gave that up, though, he thought, but there were blossoms dripping down Tsuzuki’s hand, blossoms starting to blow into the meeting room. “No,” Tsuzuki said. “Should I take more, Hisoka?”   
  
He doesn’t sound like himself, Hisoka thought, trying hard to look at Tsuzuki’s face to see whether it was really him. His eyes wouldn't move upwards, so he all he could see were Tsuzuki’s hands reaching toward him. “Tsuzuki--” he stammered, disbelieving. Tsuzuki laughed. Hisoka stood up, trying to get away. His gown tangled in the chair behind him. “What are you doing?”  
  
“Taking,” Tsuzuki said. “I always wanted to, but I didn’t want to bother you.” He leapt onto the table, terrifyingly tall and fast, and Hisoka tried harder to get the sash of his gown loose. He’d rip it if he pulled too hard, he’d be exposed and defenseless, and he couldn’t find where it was stuck.   
  
“Stop it,” Hisoka said. “It does bother me. Don’t.” Tsuzuki laughed again, and Hisoka thought that surely it was him. That was Tsuzuki’s laugh, the one Hisoka used to find so irritating. It was him, so he ought to be safe, but he wasn’t. “Please, Tsuzuki!”  
  
Then the dark shape on the table was leaping down at him, and Hisoka tried one more time to get away, but the hands were on him, shoving him down, ripping the gown away. “No!” Breath panting in his ears, and Tsuzuki’s hand on his wrists hurt so sharply it distracted him from the cold air on his skin, the hot breath on his neck. “Tsuzuki! No, please! NO!”   
  
“Hisoka!”  
  
Hands hard on his shoulders, shaking him, he was tied down and helpless. “No!”   
  
“Hisoka! It’s all right! I’m here!”   
  
Tsuzuki’s voice was urgent, and Hisoka felt his concern tugging as hard as his hands. “Stop it!”  
  
“It’s all right,” Tsuzuki said, warm and worried, “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere. Look at me.”  
  
Hisoka tried to open his eyes, found them open already, saw Tsuzuki’s attempted half-smile. He’d been trying so hard to look at his face, to see if it had really been him, and now it really was. “Get away!”  
  
“Hisoka?” Tsuzuki’s voice sounded uncertain for the first time, adding a different concern to the pastiche of worry and guilt and-- “Wake up. It’s just me.”  
  
I know that, Hisoka thought snappishly, but managed to bite it back. “Tsuzuki?”  
  
Tsuzuki’s smile grew wider, relieved. “There, you’re awake,” he said, turning on the light with a wave of his fingers. “Just a dream.”  
  
“Y... yeah,” Hisoka muttered, looking away. He _was_ , unnervingly, still wearing a hospital gown, because he was still in the infirmary, still hurting from Touda’s fires and Oriya’s blade. That explained how Tsuzuki had been there to wake him up, but he wasn’t sure he was grateful for that. The Tsuzuki in his dream had been simply, undeniably malevolent-- horribly familiar, but no more complex than that. The Tsuzuki who sat on the edge of his bed... “What time is it?”  
  
“Hm?” Tsuzuki looked up at the clock. “About... a little past four.”   
  
“Right,” Hisoka said. “You should go back to sleep.”  
  
Tsuzuki sounded doubtful. “Will you be all right?”  
  
“Fine.”   
  
“Are you sure?”  
  
“Tsuzuki!” Hisoka snapped, turning away to switch off the light. “We’re supposed to be resting, aren’t we?”   
  
“All right,” Tsuzuki’s hand, now just resting on Hisoka’s shoulder, moved to ruffle his hair. “Sure you don’t want me to tuck you in?”   
  
“Idiot,” Hisoka said, working hard to keep the panic out of his voice. “Go to sleep.”  
  
Tsuzuki sighed, and moved with perfect ease through the dark to his own bed. “Sleep well,” he said softly. Hisoka grunted. He heard Tsuzuki roll onto his back, then nothing, not even deep breathing. It would take Tsuzuki a while to get to sleep, Hisoka knew. He still felt an anxious twist of emotions; left-over adrenaline from waking up to the sound of screams, worry-- probably about what Hisoka wasn’t telling him, probably about Hisoka himself-- guilt, both his habitual background guilt, and the new, sharper one which Hisoka had felt from him ever since Tsuzuki woke up after Touda’s fires. The new guilt was so strong that he could almost hear it in words: _I just wanted to stop hurting people. I just wanted to stop hurting. I hadn’t realized I’d give you nightmares of-- of losing me. I didn’t realize the way things are (the trap I’m in,_ and there was a hint of anger there) _\-- that I’d hurt you by going, just as surely as I’d hurt them by staying. And maybe I shouldn’t have let that decide me, because their deaths will surely be worse than your hurt, but._  
  
That was where the problem lay for Hisoka. Because what followed that was warmth that pressed against him even when they weren’t touching. It could wrap around him too close to breathe. _But I won’t have you hurt, Hisoka._ These feelings sang together, not like the earlier mess. These harmonized: protectiveness, familiarity, fondness, gratitude, reliance. And under them all, weaving through, crept the new feeling, the one that had never been more than a flicker from Tsuzuki before-- desire. It all became a reaching out to him, trying to enfold him and not let go. Like he’d enfolded Tsuzuki inside the inferno, holding on so tightly that he could feel Tsuzuki’s pulse, feel his breath, his shoulder-blade bruising-hard against Hisoka’s cheek. And now Tsuzuki was reaching back as strongly as Hisoka had reached for him, welcoming the embrace.   
  
Hisoka shivered.   
  
  
*************************************************************************  
  
  
It wasn’t that Hisoka never thought about sex. It wasn’t even that he never thought about sex with Tsuzuki. His body was sixteen, after all (though he was well over eighteen by now, with hundreds of years to go). Being able to feel anything at all meant he was stuck with feeling this, too--sweat and desire coming on him at any hour of day or night. So yes, he thought about it. He simply didn’t enjoy the thoughts or the sensations that went with them. He didn’t like knowing that his face would flush or his breath would catch without his having any say over it. It seemed like one more way for his body to betray him. He’d felt his body collapse around him during his years in the hospital; he’d known he couldn’t trust it. And then Muraki had made it perfectly clear that Hisoka’s body was his, really. His to claim, his to use, his to mark, and then his to destroy as often as he liked. He might lose interest, but the body would never feel like Hisoka’s again.  
  
It wasn’t just his body, either. Really, he was nothing but his soul now, and his soul was mortgaged to Enma. His emotions, of course, had never been his own. It had been years before he knew that, for other people, emotions were personal. He’d had no idea until his mother had screamed it to him. Then came a long while of trying to sort out which feeling was whose in the wash of fears and pains. He still couldn’t manage it-- wasn’t sure how much of that disgust with himself was hers, how much his father’s, how much his own. It took careful work, thinking clearly and logically: do I have a reason to feel that? If not, then it’s not mine. It’s someone else’s. He relied on his mind to tell him what he felt, and it was complicated. He’d much rather ignore his emotions completely when he could and think things through. He could trust his own mind, anyway.  
  
Except when it was channeling his hormones. Except when memories were taken and returned like spare change. Except when he slept, and his subconscious could ambush him. Except when Tsuzuki was _feeling_ at him, wanting him, day and night. Damn him. Couldn’t even shut up when he slept. Hisoka curled onto his side, facing the wall.   
  
  
*************************************************************************  
  
He almost managed to get away clean. He briefly considered going out the window, dismissed it as being ridiculous, and regretted the dismissal when he ran into Tatsumi, who was obviously patrolling the corridors before settling in for a day of work.   
  
Tatsumi smiled. “Kurosaki-kun. You’re feeling better?”  
  
Hisoka nodded. “Yes, thanks. Watari-san said I could go.”  
  
Tatsumi smiled. “That’s good to hear.” He glanced at the pack on Hisoka’s back. “What’s this?”  
  
Hisoka shrugged. “I’m using some of my vacation days now. I have a week stored up.”  
  
“Oh?” Hisoka wondered whether or not Tatsumi was going to bother him about missing more work. He hoped not. He wasn’t in the mood to argue. “That’s probably a good idea. Where are you going?”  
  
“Hakkotsu-san,” Hisoka said. The Younger Gushoushin had promised him that the mountain was the most sparsely populated of any of the places he could afford and had pretty nice views. Right now, he didn’t care if the place was a sewer as long as he could be alone in it.   
  
“Hakkotsu-san? For vacation?” Tatsumi raised his eyebrows. “Was that your idea or Tsuzuki-san’s?”  
  
“Mine,” Hisoka said, not sure what Tatsumi’s tone meant. It took work to read the Shadow-Master’s emotions, and he didn’t want to make the effort at the moment. “Tsuzuki isn’t coming.”  
  
He didn’t need to work to feel Tatsumi’s concern at that. “You’re leaving him right now?”  
  
“He has another few days in the infirmary,” Hisoka said. “I’ll be back by the time he’s ready for work.”   
  
That didn’t seem to be Tatsumi’s point. “I see,” he said. He looked like he was about to say more.  
  
Respect for his superiors notwithstanding, Hisoka wasn’t in the mood to hear it. “I’ll be back in a few days, Tatsumi-san. I’ll see you then.” He turned, not waiting for dismissal, and headed out.   
  
  
*************************************************************************   
  
The mountain views were indeed pretty nice, Hisoka supposed. For a while he’d found heights and open spaces unnerving, but he was mostly over that. He had no rational reason for it, after all, and it could get in his way if he let it. So he hiked up the path, watching his feet, watching the road before and behind, and letting the views trail along as background. The isolation was all he’d hoped for. He hadn’t seen a single person since he’d left the town below, and he almost felt he could relax a little. Not completely, obviously, not that he ever did. But at least here he wasn’t constantly straining against people _pushing_ at him.   
  
It wasn’t that he missed the time he’d spent locked up in the cell in the basement. He tried not to remember it too clearly-- hours of staring at the wall, too miserable to summon up the energy to want to do something else. But he had gotten used to it. If nothing else, it had been safe. Routine. Nothing since he’d left his parents’ house had been predictable-- he kept having to unlearn everything he knew, and it wore him out. If he hadn’t gotten sick, he wouldn’t be feeling like this.  
  
Damn right you wouldn’t, he thought sharply. You’d be feeling empty and pointless and trapped and so bored you thought about slitting your wrists just for something to do. You’ve done more that was worthwhile in the year since you died than did in your entire lifetime, and you know it. You _are_ more than you were then. You had no idea your empathy could be useful. You would have frozen screaming if you’d seen a demon. You didn’t have the slightest idea how to talk to people or that you’d want to. You’d never even had a friend, let alone people who’d charge into a fight for you. You couldn’t imagine why anyone would.   
  
And you could never have saved someone’s life just by talking to him.  
  
Ah. Hisoka walked faster, bending his legs deeply to climb steep, rough-cut stone steps. And here he was, on exactly the thought he’d been trying to escape. Because that was true. He had saved Tsuzuki’s life just by asking. Begging. Curling up around him and sobbing and demanding that he live... and he had. He had bent his head and assented, and now he was living “just for me.”   
  
So. Now what?   
  
Hisoka paused, panting. The stairs stopped by a little shrine so old and worn that he couldn't tell what kami might have been honored there or how long ago. Around it, ferns and twisting conifers stretched up the mountainside, the darkness among them too deep to see how steeply they climbed. His lungs rasped, and he wasn’t sure whether it was the exercise or left-over searing from the smoke he’d breathed in. He could have died again. He would have died if Tsuzuki hadn’t agreed to come out. No-- because it would have been too late for that, if Tatsumi hadn’t managed to get to them. He still didn’t know whether that had been his intention, to die if Tsuzuki wouldn’t live. He hadn’t thought about it at the time, about what the odds were he’d actually be able to save him. He’d just known he had to stay with Tsuzuki.  
  
And he had. And Tsuzuki had lived for him.   
  
Which meant Hisoka owed him something to live for. Didn’t it?   
  
Hisoka started climbing again, more slowly. It had been easy to say then, desperately sobbing out the words-- I need you. Live for me. I don’t want to be alone again. He hadn’t been thinking about consequences or about all the things he usually kept so carefully from saying. He’d been too busy trying to find the right thing to say, the thing that would keep Tsuzuki from leaving him, and he didn’t have time to think about why that threat scared him so much. Or what it would mean to admit that it did. What else it was admitting about what he felt, what it meant to the two of them.  
  
He didn’t know what Tsuzuki had thought then. His partner’s face had been so empty, his voice so defeatedly sad. But then he had held Hisoka close, and Hisoka had felt life sparking inside him where it had been so set on smothering out. When they’d awakened back in Meifu, the spark had been blazing, more so every time Hisoka met his eyes. Days and nights in the infirmary beds, Hisoka kept noticing Tsuzuki notice him and smile. He’d felt warmed for a while.   
  
He just didn’t know how to stop it. And he was starting to smell smoke.  
  
Hisoka looked up the hillside, wondering how long he’d been smelling it without noticing. Probably just a cooking-fire, he thought-- the mountain couldn’t really be as deserted as it looked, or there would be no need for a road. Nothing to worry about, probably-- and he was _not_ going to add fire to his list of incipient phobias. There was no real reason to worry about it, and he had just determined not to when he heard the screams.  
  
Hisoka jumped, blinking from the path to a spot further up the mountain. From here he could smell the smoke, too harsh and stinking to be just firewood burning. It sounded like dozens of people screaming, terrified. He ran, forgetting the pain in his lungs, racing upwards toward the fire. He couldn’t see it yet, but he must be getting close. He stumbled up the path, almost tripping over loose stones, picking up speed as he ran over the flat ground. The screams were deafening. The screams were behind him.  
  
Hisoka turned. The fire roared all around him; he coughed in the smoke, but he saw nothing. Just the stone foundations of some ancient building, the forest growing through and around them. Someone screamed next to him. He spun and saw nothing except the ferns shaking in his passage.   
  
“Who’s there?” he called, throwing up a shield. “Where are you?”  
  
Silence. The smoke started to clear, blowing away on the passing breeze. Hisoka was alone in the ruin.   
  
“Who’s there?” he called again.   
  
There was a rustle in the ferns behind him. Hisoka whirled.   
  
“Just me,” Tsuzuki said. He waved sheepishly. “Hi.”   
  
  
**************************************************************************   
  
  
“Tsuzuki!” Hisoka wasn’t sure what the expression was on his face, but it couldn’t have been terribly welcoming from the way that his partner’s fell. “Did you hear them?”  
  
Tsuzuki shook his head, looking around. “Who?”  
  
“I don’t know.” Hisoka sniffed, but there was only a hint of smoke left in the air. “I heard screaming. But when I got here-- nothing.”   
  
“Hm.” It was always odd to watch Tsuzuki’s face when he switched into work-mode. He got so focused so abruptly, eyes narrowed, mouth looking like it didn’t know what a smile was. “Did you notice anything else?”  
  
”Smoke.”   
  
Tsuzuki sniffed the air. “What do you think it was?”  
  
“I’m not sure,” Hisoka said. “Illusion, maybe. Or ghosts.” He could deal with Tsuzuki like this, as a partner. That still worked. He was glad of it. As long as they kept it like this.  
  
Tsuzuki nodded. “What do you feel?”  
  
Or not. “I haven’t tried to,” Hisoka said reluctantly. He could feel Tsuzuki already, even as he tried to focus on anything except his empathy. If he actually tried to reach out with it...   
  
“Why not?” Tsuzuki asked, looking intently at Hisoka. “Is there something else?”  
  
He had to ask. “I’m not sure,” Hisoka said, not meeting his eyes. “The screams were so frightened already...”   
  
Tsuzuki’s eyes were so kind. “It’s okay, Hisoka.” He looked around at the trees twisting their way through the ruin. “Did you feel cold?”  
  
Hisoka thought back. “Yes,” he said. “A ghost, then.”   
  
Tsuzuki nodded. “Maybe a lot of them,” he said. He sighed. “Well, so much for vacation. We sure have that kind of luck, don’t we?”  
  
Hisoka blinked, reminded. “What...” are you doing here, he’d started to say, but it would sound as if he didn’t want to see him. He didn’t, of course, but he couldn’t bring himself to say that to Tsuzuki. “How did you know where to find me?”  
  
“Huh? Tatsumi told me,” Tsuzuki said. “I guess you didn’t think I’d catch up with you this quickly.”   
  
There was a hint of uncertainty hidden behind the words, Tsuzuki wanting one more reassurance-- so you do want me with you, right? You really don’t hate me for everything I’ve done? Hisoka wasn’t sure how to answer it because what Tsuzuki had done in the past really wasn’t the point. “I thought you had another few days in the infirmary,” he said, stalling.   
  
Tsuzuki shrugged. “Watari said as long as I take it easy, it’s no problem. I’ll be okay to check this out.”  
  
“What for?” Hisoka said. He crossed his arms, still chilly. “Ghosts aren’t our job. They’re already dead. The onmyouji can handle it.”  
  
“That bunch of paper-pushers?” Tsuzuki shivered. “As long as I don’t have to talk to them. They always give me the creeps.” He brightened. “I’ll call Tatsumi later and tell him to tell them.”  
  
Good, Hisoka thought sharply. Serves him right. “Fine.”  
  
“Okay,” Tsuzuki said. “So now what?”   
  
Hisoka had no idea.   
  
Tsuzuki snapped his fingers. “Dinner!” he said. “The sun’s going to set soon. We’d better find somewhere to stay for the night.” He looked around. “I didn’t see any inns yet...”  
  
“There aren’t any,” Hisoka said. “I brought a tent.” And one bedroll. Tsuzuki, from the look of him, had brought a trenchcoat and whatever was in the small bag slung over his shoulder. Hisoka frowned. Maybe I can send him back to Meifu to sleep... He pushed the thought aside to deal with later. “We should go further up.”  
  
Tsuzuki nodded. “Let’s go,” he said, leaving the ruin with a sweep of his coat. Hisoka followed.   
  
The ferns behind them glowed red in the setting sunlight.  
  
  
**************************************************************************  
  
It didn't take long before Hisoka realized that the tent was easier to set up without Tsuzuki’s help and sent him to get firewood. Or, rather, it was easier without Tsuzuki there, period. The vague awareness which had set in when Tsuzuki arrived grew clearer and stronger every time his partner looked at him. It made it hard to think, hard to concentrate on anything without constantly noticing him. Hisoka found himself remembering how _annoying_ he’d found the other shinigami when they were first working together. He just won’t go away.  
  
Except that he almost had, of course. Hisoka scowled at the tent peg.   
  
“Want me to take a look at it?” Tsuzuki asked, dropping a load of clattering branches to the ground.   
  
Hisoka jumped. “No. I’ve got it.” He made a few adjustments, stood, and looked down at the one-person tent. “It’s set.”   
  
Tsuzuki also looked over at the tent, and his smile shook a little at the edges. “Good. I’ll get the fire started.”  
  
Hisoka watched him. “Those twigs are too small to burn for long,” he complained.  
  
“They’re kindling,” Tsuzuki said. “Don’t you--” He stopped, then went on with a barely perceptible pause. “worry about it. I’ve done this plenty of times.” He struck a match and set the flames to licking at the larger logs piled above.   
  
Hisoka looked away. He hadn’t made a campfire before. He hadn’t, for that matter, slept outdoors before (unless you counted eventually collapsing unconscious that night, which he did not and would not and did not care to think about at the moment). He’d set off assuming that he could figure it out easily enough-- how hard could it be? Harder than he’d thought, like most things he’d never bothered with. He wasn’t sure what the difference was between something he’d never bothered with and something he’d been too scared to try.  
  
Tsuzuki hummed as he went through Hisoka’s bag, pulling out cooking supplies. “Eh? Hisoka, where’s the mochi?”  
  
“I didn’t bring any,” Hisoka said.   
  
“You didn’t?!” Tsuzuki stared at him, aghast. “What are we going to have after dinner?”  
  
“I hadn’t been planning to have anything,” Hisoka said.   
  
“You hadn’t? That’s horrible! You can’t go camping without mochi! How could you do such a thing?”  
  
“I really didn’t care,” Hisoka snapped. “What difference does it make?”   
  
There was a long pause. “I’ll cook,” Hisoka said, finally. “Curry, all right?” He looked down, setting up the cooking equipment.   
  
“Hisoka,” Tsuzuki said quietly, “do you want me to go back?”  
  
“I--” Hisoka said, not looking at him. His hand slipped onto the brazier he’d just set over the fire and he jerked it back, burned. “No. Of course not.”  
  
“I don’t want to get in your way,” Tsuzuki said. “If you don’t want me along. I should probably be in bed still, anyway.”  
  
“No,” Hisoka said. “I’m glad you’re here. I just...” He fumbled for words. “I wanted to think. About... Muraki.”  
  
Tsuzuki’s eyes widened. “Hisoka...” Then he nodded. “It’s a good idea.”   
  
“Right,” Hisoka said.   
  
None of which answered the question of whether Tsuzuki should stay or go. Nor was it going to. Hisoka swallowed hard and said, “I thought we should sleep in shifts. We don’t know what’s out here besides ghosts.”  
  
“Shifts?” Tsuzuki said. “Aw. Does that mean you’re not going to share the bed with me?” But he felt happier.   
  
Hisoka didn’t. “Shut up! Idiot!”   
  
Tsuzuki looked wounded with perfect cheer. Hisoka turned away and tried to think about nothing but spicing the curry. It didn’t work.


	2. Chapter 2

After dinner, Tsuzuki was flagging enough that Hisoka had no trouble persuading him to sleep first. He felt the other shinigami drop off into sleep and sighed-- he’d have a few hours to himself now before Tsuzuki started dreaming. One night in the infirmary had been all he’d needed to decide that he hated other people’s dreams, too.

Hisoka stared into the campfire, then turned away. Watching the light was bad for his night-vision, made it hard to see into the darkness clearly. Not that he really expected any danger, but-- there wasn’t enough room for both of them to sleep on that bedroll. Unless they slept close, the thought came, and he blushed and scowled. Dammit, he did not want to sleep with Tsuzuki. Or-- he meant-- not sleep with, just-- He sent a sharp thought through his head, slicing through the muddle: he didn’t want to let Tsuzuki do that to him. He didn’t want to let Tsuzuki hurt him that way. And he liked to think Tsuzuki wouldn’t. He’d never hurt him before.

That is, he’d never hurt him when he’d been himself. When he knew what he was doing. When he was thinking about something besides his own guilt. For that matter, Hisoka still didn’t know exactly what Tsuzuki felt so guilty about-- what he might have done, or to whom he might have done it.

This isn’t fair, Hisoka thought. He’s finally asleep, and I’m still thinking about him. What do I have to do to get some peace?

He peered out past the campfire into the shadows under the trees. There were still ruins around here. The worn, smooth stone he was sitting on had probably been a building stone mouldering centuries ago. He wondered how long the ghosts had been there. They’re not that different from us in some ways, he thought. But I’d hate to be stuck like that. It’s like everything about them disappears except for whatever they’re holding onto, and they can’t do anything except remember it. They stop being people. You’d think they’d notice and move on while they still had enough of themselves left to want to. Pain’s bad enough without becoming nothing but pain. He looked back at the fire, unnerved. Maybe he hadn’t wanted to take some time to think. He didn’t seem to like any of his thoughts. He tried to still his mind, to just be aware of the world around him. Wind in the trees. The fire crackling. Forest animals making their own rustles and barks and howls. Chanting.

Hisoka stood, blinking his eyes hard to try to get his night vision back. The chanting stayed exactly the same volume, not sounding quite human. It sounded more like the wind and the fire were coming together, the sounds of the forest joining in to make one monotonous voice. He looked, but saw nothing under the trees. He hesitated, then reached out, trying to direct his empathy to the search. There... something cold and unmoving and very tired. Not far away. It felt quite close, actually. It felt like it was just on the far side of the fire.

Hisoka stared across the flames, but he couldn’t see anything for certain. It looked like the flames were glinting off something there, maybe tree branches. He stood. “Who’s there?”

The chanting continued, the syllables repeating over and over, unchanging. “Hey,” Hisoka said. “Answer me.”

Nothing. Just the words of prayer, like the night wind. Hisoka started to move around the fire. I should wake Tsuzuki, he thought, but he wanted to see it first. He heard his breath speed up, felt his palms sweat. Another step around the campfire, and he could see a shadow. Another few steps, and he should be able to see it. He took them. There.

The skeleton was holding beads in its fleshless hands, rocking back and forth in prayer. It might have been looking at him, or it might have just been looking straight ahead. There was no way to tell whether its empty eye sockets could see anything in the living world at all. Its jaw moved soundlessly with the chant. Its bones rasped on the rock when it moved.

Hisoka jumped backwards, snapping a shield up. The skeleton seemed to take no notice, just went on with its prayer. “Get out,” Hisoka said. “I order you. Begone from here.” The chanting grew louder. “Leave,” Hisoka said. “Now.”

The skeleton turned, and he’d been wrong before, he could tell perfectly when the empty eyes were looking at him. They were looking at him now. The vertebrae twisted as it turned its face toward him, and the arm bones slid along each other’s smooth surfaces with a squeak. Hisoka held up an ofuda, keeping his shield in place. “Go,” he said. The skeleton seemed to shiver. Then it changed.

Flesh covered the bones from the inside out, blood to flesh to skin to fur. Horns sprouted from the head as the figure rose and kept rising, taller than Hisoka, taller than the trees. Arms formed, clawed and stringy-muscled, reaching for him. Hisoka stared up at it. “Tsuzuki!” he shouted. “Devil! Tsuzuki!”

The tent flap opened just enough for three ofuda to come flying out of it, striking the devil on the arms and shoulder. It roared and jumped over the fire to smash a huge hand down on the tent. Tsuzuki scrambled out, almost getting caught as the tent collapsed behind him. Hisoka dropped his shield and circled around to the other side, casting ofuda of his own. The devil struck out with one hand toward each of them and they dodged, landing together behind the smashed tent. “Hisoka!” Tsuzuki said. “Are you all right?”

”Fine!” Hisoka said. “It just appeared.” Another hand came crashing down on them, and they dodged in different directions. Tsuzuki leapt into the air, casting again, and the devil fell back, roaring. Hisoka got one glimpse of a roaring mouth and enraged red eyes. Then it disappeared, and there was nothing above him but the darkness of the trees.

“Hisoka!” Tsuzuki paused to make sure it was gone, then ran over to him. “What happened?”

Hisoka described the skeleton, finding himself more unnerved by retelling the details than he had let himself be at the time. “It felt odd,” he said. “A ghost should feel angry or sad, but it was peaceful. But not really peaceful.” He thought about it. “As if the peace were a strain for it, something it had to put all its effort into keeping. Like being at peace were enough to hurt it.” He frowned. “That doesn’t make sense.”

”No?” Tsuzuki looked rueful. “It does to me.”

Hisoka didn’t know what to say to that. He felt as if he’d misstepped, said more than he’d wanted to-- no, that Tsuzuki had said more than he’d wanted him to. Now he had to answer him in kind or say something that showed he understood, or something to make Tsuzuki feel better, and what the hell was there to say? Tsuzuki noticed his hesitation and smiled it away. “Anyway, this is definitely something that needs to be dealt with. That wasn’t just a ghost. It could have hurt someone. I’m calling the office.”

“Now?” Hisoka said.

“I’ll leave a message,” Tsuzuki said. He put a hand down to the pocket he wasn’t wearing, as he was in pajamas. Which, Hisoka couldn’t help but notice, had come open in the fight, showing off quite a lot of his partner’s bare chest. He hoped that the dim lighting hid his blush. Cut that out, he thought to his face, futilely as ever. Tsuzuki half-laughed at his own mistake and went back to the tent to find his trenchcoat.

He stopped on the other side of the fire. “Oh, no...”

“What?” Hisoka followed him around and looked down at the flattened pile of cloth which had been the tent. Tsuzuki tugged at one end of it, and distressing crunching noises came from inside. “Well,” Tsuzuki said, crawling into the open end. “Let’s see...”

“See what?” Hisoka asked. “Do you have any light in there?” The flashlight, he remembered, had been inside the tent. There was the sound of Tsuzuki bumping into something and swearing. Hisoka sighed. “Tsuzuki...”

“It’s okay!” Tsuzuki called from inside. A hand emerged from a rip in the side of the tent, dragging a trench coat. Tsuzuki pushed the crumpled tent off his head, reached into the pocket of the coat, and triumphantly pulled out... shards. He lost the triumphant look. “Um...”

“That was your cell phone?” Hisoka asked.

Tsuzuki nodded. “Was yours on you?”

Hisoka shook his head. “I left it back in Meifu.”

“Oh.” Tsuzuki sat back on his heels. “Well, we can’t do anything about it now. We’ll head home in the morning.” He reached back inside the tent. “The bedroll felt all right. Why don’t you sleep?”

“I’m okay,” Hisoka said. Tired as he’d been, he didn’t feel remotely sleepy.

“Hisoka,” Tsuzuki wheedled. He tugged the bedroll out, putting it and the sleeping bag on top of the remains of the tent. “How are you going to heal if you don’t rest?”

“Out here?” Hisoka said.

Tsuzuki sat down on a stone. “I’ll watch over you.”

There wasn’t much to say to that, either. Hisoka kicked off his shoes and crawled under the sleeping bag. He could feel Tsuzuki’s eyes on him, warm and watchful, long after he fell asleep.

************************************************************************

It wasn’t dreaming this time, not exactly. Hisoka was drifting upwards, wandering the place between waking and sleeping, and desire pulsed hot through him. He wanted. He saw himself, eyes shut, the sunlight setting his hair to glow golden. Beautiful, he felt. His mouth had fallen slightly open, and he so wanted to kiss it, to hold himself close. So beautiful. So very dear.

That’s not mine, he thought sharply, and woke. The image disappeared, but the desire was still perfectly apparent in his body. He swore silently. He kept his eyes closed, but he could feel Tsuzuki very close by, wanting him. Stop it, he thought. Now. I-- His eyes snapped open.

Tsuzuki sat back, startled by the suddenness of Hisoka’s movement. Alarm flashed through him, and fear of embarassment. Hisoka stared up at him, again unsure what to say. There was no way to say, ‘it’s okay, I didn’t feel what you were thinking,’ without making it perfectly obvious that he had, and besides, it wasn’t okay. He didn’t want Tsuzuki looking at him like that. In his experience, though, once someone started that, what you wanted didn’t matter any more. But it’s Tsuzuki, dammit, he thought, feeling cheated.

“Good morning,” Tsuzuki said. He sounded over-cheerful, but at least he was backing away, standing up.

“Morning,” Hisoka said, sitting up and pulling himself back to calm. “Did anything else happen?”

Tsuzuki shook his head. “It was quiet all night long.” His eyes looked tired, and Hisoka wished he had woken up earlier to make him trade shifts. “The food looks like it’s mostly all right,” he said, gesturing to Hisoka’s pack, which he’d pulled out of the ruin of the tent. “So we can have breakfast just fine. But then we’d better head down to the town to find a phone.”

Hisoka nodded. Stop it, he thought to his body. Stop it now. I have to get up. And I don’t want him to see. It’s nothing to do with me, and I don’t want him to think it is. His head hurt. “Right.”

Tsuzuki turned away to the fire, where he’d set water boiling. “Do you want tea?”

“You made it?” Hisoka said. Surely there wasn’t that much that Tsuzuki could have done to tea leaves...

“Yep! My super-special top-secret mornings-in-the-great-outdoors blend! It’s famous.” Tsuzuki handed him a cup, smiling widely.

Hisoka sniffed it. “What is it?”

“If I tell you that, how will it be a secret?” Tsuzuki poured himself a cup and sat down, inhaling the steam happily. He watched Hisoka’s expression. “Come on, Hisoka. It won’t kill you.”

“I’m already dead,” Hisoka pointed out. Shinigami humor got old fast, and he didn’t engage in it often-- he must be really rattled. He drank in silence while Tsuzuki praised his own tea, the smell of the morning air on the mountain, the view. Hisoka focused on the cup in his hands and, by the time he’d finished it, felt that he could get up without anything showing. “Let’s get going.”

“As soon as I clean up,” Tsuzuki said, holding up the tea pot. “There’s a stream that way if you want to brush your teeth.” Hisoka nodded, digging through his pack. The stream was far enough out of sight that he took the chance to splash water on himself and quickly change clothes. That wasn’t normal either-- he was never comfortable hanging around naked, but he didn’t usually worry about it this much. I don’t usually have reason to, he thought bitterly.

Stop it, he thought. It wasn’t as if Tsuzuki had done anything. Emotions aren’t actions, and it wasn’t as if the other shinigami had any control over them or as if he intended them to affect Hisoka. Still. Hisoka returned to the campfire and folded up the remains of the tent quickly. “We could just blink down,” he said.

Tsuzuki handed him the brazier to pack. “Do you sense anything supernatural now?”

“No,” Hisoka said, checking.

“Then why don’t we walk a while?” Tsuzuki said. “It’s a beautiful morning. It’d be a shame to just go back to work without even looking around.”

Hisoka shrugged. Here or back at the office, he supposed he’d have the same problem. Except that here we’re alone in the middle of nowhere, he thought, with no-one for miles around to hear. He choked. It’s Tsuzuki, he thought fiercely. He’s not going to do anything. I trust him. Why am I thinking like this? “Sure,” he said. “This way.”

They walked down the path, Tsuzuki trying for a while to make conversation. Then they walked in silence. Then Tsuzuki said, “Hisoka...”

“Mm?”

“How do you feel about me?”

Hisoka spluttered. “What?”

Tsuzuki looked and felt as if he hadn’t expected himself to say that either. “I mean, I know it’s a stupid question, you don’t have to answer it if you don’t want to, I shouldn’t have said anything...” It was the babble of a man hoping to be interrupted, but for the moment Hisoka could only stare. Tsuzuki stopped. “Never mind.”

He turned away, angry and embarassed and... scared, Hisoka realized, growing more so every second Hisoka didn’t answer. The anger was directed inward, Hisoka felt. He’d start hurting himself again in a minute... “You’re my partner,” he said quickly. The fear checked. “Idiot,” Hisoka added, and the fear started to recede.

“Right,” Tsuzuki said, producing a smile.

They walked on, Tsuzuki wavering in hopeful uncertainty, Hisoka wishing he were several thousand miles away. Or being attacked by a demon. Or anything that meant Tsuzuki wouldn’t say anything else or, worse, expect him to say something else. His luck had never been that good. “I’m glad,” Tsuzuki said softly. “It’s good to be your partner, Hisoka.”

Hisoka shrugged. “You’re too much trouble, you know,” he said. “You eat too much, and you whine too much.” And you keep looking at me like that and feeling that about me, and I wish you’d stop. But I’m not saying so. I’m saying-- I don’t know what I’m saying. I’m saying what I always say, but it means something after what you just said, and I don’t know what, and it’s not what I mean. I don’t know what I mean. You make things so complicated.

“I know,” Tsuzuki said. “Guess it’s hopeless, huh?”

“Looks like,” Hisoka said. Let that be an end to it.

Tsuzuki put a hand on his shoulder.

Hisoka jerked away, turning sharply to knock Tsuzuki’s hand off. Tsuzuki drew back, startled. “Hisoka!”

Hisoka shook. “I...” Tsuzuki was staring at him, hurt and confused and crashingly disappointed. What did you expect? Hisoka wondered, angry, and didn’t think he wanted to know the answer.

Tsuzuki put his hand to his side. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to--” Hisoka waited to hear how he’d end the sentence, sure that whatever he said would only make things worse. “I didn’t mean anything.”

Hisoka nodded warily, feeling his eyes gone wide, his breath fast. “It’s fine,” he said. “I just don’t...” There was nothing to say. “Let’s go back to work.”

Tsuzuki nodded, and they set off down the path again. If he’d wanted to be somewhere else before, now he was just wishing Tsuzuki were somewhere else. Anywhere. No. “I like you,” he said because he had to say something. “But not...” He trailed off, lost, hating it.

“Not like that?” Tsuzuki said. His feelings had gone into crashing cacophany, but his tone was very mild. Hisoka nodded. Tsuzuki felt worse, but sounded just the same. “All right,” he said. “All right. Don’t worry about it.”

“I’m not worried,” Hisoka said, sounding too shakily indignant to be anything but. “You’re not going to...” That should end a reassurance. He wasn’t feeling reassuring.

“Bother you,” Tsuzuki said. “I’m not going to do anything you don’t want me to, Hisoka.” It was his gentling voice, the one he used on frightened children, and Hisoka was almost annoyed enough about that not to feel relieved. “We’ll forget about it, okay?”

Hisoka nodded. “Yeah.”

“All right,” Tsuzuki said. Hisoka felt nearly overwhelmed by the intensity of his partner’s disappointment, regret, humiliation, guilt, worry, sick realization that a belief had been proved horribly wrong. Tsuzuki smiled. “Let’s go.”

They kept walking, occasionally commenting on the shrines they passed, the bird-calls, bits of office gossip. Mostly, Hisoka felt his partner’s strain to be cheerful, calm, and perfectly normal, and his own to respond to it.

It was almost a relief when the branch swung out around a corner and smashed Tsuzuki full across the face.

 

************************************************************************

 

“Tsuzuki!”

Hisoka darted forward to catch his partner as he fell heavily backward. The figure with the branch raised it for another blow. Hisoka lowered Tsuzuki to the ground and lunged to grab the assailant's arm. He-- no, she, he realized-- struggled wildly. “Stop it! No! Let go of me!”

“Tsuzuki!” Hisoka called. Tsuzuki groaned. Blood was fountaining from his nose, but he sat up, and Hisoka breathed a sigh of relief. He turned to the girl he held. “What did you think you were doing?”

She was still screaming, trying to pull her arms free. “Let go!” Hisoka dodged a heel aimed at his instep.

“Hisoka,” Tsuzuki said, standing. “Let her go.”

“She attacked you,” Hisoka argued, raising his voice over her shouts.

Tsuzuki put a hand to his nose, pinching it shut. “Come on, Hisoka-- does she look dangerous to you?” Hisoka reluctantly released his hold, and the girl jerked away from him. “It’s all right, miss. We won’t hurt you.”

Her eyes flicked from one face to the other. She looked about the age of Hisoka’s body, maybe a little younger. “You’re human!” she said.

Tsuzuki started. “What else would we be?” Hisoka asked.

The girl was still holding the branch up in front of her, ready to ward them off, but her expression was melting from anger to dismay. “I--” she said. “I thought you were a demon.”

Hisoka felt Tsuzuki flinch, but his face stayed calm. “We don’t look like demons, do we?” he asked, smiling.

She shook her head, her short hair bouncing around her face. “I’m so sorry! I thought-- I am so sorry! Is your nose okay?”

Tsuzuki laughed. “It’s fine,” he said, wiping his face. The blood disappeared. "See?"

She smiled back. “I’m so glad. I thought I hit you really hard.”

“I’m hard-headed,” Tsuzuki said. “Right, Hisoka?”

Hisoka made a non-committal noise. “Who did you think we were?” he asked, watching her carefully.

She shook her head. “Oh, you know,” she said. “You imagine things in the woods. It’s stupid.” She dropped the branch, trying and failing to seem casual about it.

She looks like hell, Hisoka thought. Her skirt was muddy, her knees scraped, her blouse torn. There were leaves and needles in her hair, and she looked like she hadn’t slept for days. Weeks. “What were you doing out here?” he asked.

“School trip,” she said. “I got lost.”

Hisoka looked at the stone path at their feet, which clearly led down the mountain. “When?”

“I’m not sure,” she said.

Hisoka glanced at Tsuzuki, trying to convey all his suspicion with a look. “We’re going down to the town,” Tsuzuki said reassuringly. “Why don’t you come with us?” Hisoka sighed.

She nodded. “I’m Asano Keiko,” she said with a small bow.

Tsuzuki introduced them. “Keiko-chan,” he said. “Did you see anything strange out here?”

“Strange?” she asked brightly.

“You know,” Tsuzuki said, friendly and calm. “Like ghosts.”

“Gh--” Keiko looked from one to the other of them and backed away. “You again,” she breathed. “I knew it was you!” She glared furious fear at them, then turned and ran into the woods.

 

**************************************************************************

“Damn!” Tsuzuki cursed, starting into the forest after her. “Come on, Hisoka!”

”Wait,” Hisoka said, following him. “I don’t believe her.”

“No, of course not,” Tsuzuki said, pushing branches out of his way. “School trips don’t go this time of year.”

“And there was a phone in her pocket the whole time,” Hisoka said.

Tsuzuki kept moving. “But she was so frightened.”

Hisoka couldn’t argue with that. “This way,” he said. “She doubled back.” Tsuzuki nodded and followed him. “She felt human, though,” he said, trying to move more quietly through the underbrush.

“Good,” Tsuzuki said. “So we just have to figure out what she was doing here. And what she has to do with everything else.”

“Right,” Hisoka panted. My lungs again, he thought. I shouldn’t be winded this quickly. In which case, Tsuzuki... he heard Tsuzuki stumbling behind him and slowed. This is not what Watari meant by ‘taking it easy,’ he thought.

“What’s wrong?” Tsuzuki asked, catching up to him.

“Nothing,” Hisoka said. “But she can’t keep running. She looked exhausted.”

Tsuzuki nodded. “Is she still close enough to hear?” At Hisoka’s nod, he stopped moving. “Keiko-chan!” he called. “We’re here to help!” There was no answer from the woods. “We can find the demon for you!” he went on, his voice very loud among the quiet forest noises. “You don’t have to be afraid!”

There was a rustle ahead of them. Hisoka couldn’t tell whether it was her or a squirrel, but Tsuzuki looked encouraged. “Just come tell us what’s going on,” he called. “You can trust us.”

“How do I know that?” Her voice came from-- over there, Hisoka saw, behind a pile of fallen stones.

Tsuzuki paused, at a loss. “Instinct?”

Silence from behind the stones.

“Look,” Hisoka called. “You can talk to us, or you can run around the woods some more. I don’t care which.” Tsuzuki looked reproachful. Hisoka shrugged.

There was no answer for a while. A bird called. “Keiko-chan,” Tsuzuki called, “don’t you want to go home?”

There was a muffled noise from behind the ruin. “Look-- if you’re telling the truth, and you’re not it-- then you wouldn’t understand.”

“Aren’t you underestimating us?” Tsuzuki asked, more softly now that they knew where she was. “We understand that you’re scared. We understand how much better it feels not to be all by yourself. We can help.”

He’s doing that again, Hisoka thought. She’s going to trust him for no reason at all except that he tells her she can. It struck him as a stupid thing to do, but he remembered exactly what it felt like.

Keiko seemed to have more resistance than most people, though-- she wasn’t coming out. “Y-you,” she called, voice trembling, “you should go away.”

Tsuzuki glanced at Hisoka. “Someone will have to come back here anyway,” Hisoka pointed out. “Probably us. If she doesn’t want to come with us...”

“Hisoka!” Tsuzuki said. “We can’t leave her here with those things!”

“Why not?” Hisoka asked. “She’s managed fine for days.”

Tsuzuki crossed his arms stubbornly. “That’s not what I’d call ‘fine.’”

Hisoka sighed. He’s so unreasonable, he thought with unexpected relief. This felt familiar and right-- coming face-to-face with Tsuzuki’s inherent decency, trying to argue with it, and being reassuringly incapable of making a dent. This is who he is, Hisoka told himself. Not what I’ve been feeling from him. “Well, what do you want to do, then?” he surrendered.

“Keiko-chan,” Tsuzuki called, “we won’t come any closer, but can you tell us about it?” Silence. “We saw a ghost last night,” Tsuzuki said. “A skeleton. Did you see it?”

Keiko’s voice was rough. “You aren’t going to guess it,” she said. “Stop trying.”

Tsuzuki made a startled, thoughtful noise. “You haven’t seen it?” he asked. “What about a devil? It was very tall with long red hair and horns?”

“Don’t be stupid,” Keiko called, choking on a sob. “Devils aren’t real.”

“Lots of things are real,” Tsuzuki called. “It doesn’t matter what you tell us-- we’ll believe you.” He chuckled. “We’ve seen something stranger, I promise.”

The voice from behind the stones sounded desperate. “But even if you did, there’s nothing you can do about it, so there’s no point in talking!”

“If you tell us what it is,” Tsuzuki called, “we can see whether we can do something about it.”

“No, you-- no!” Her voice rose in a shriek. “No!”

Tsuzuki jerked forward at the terror in her voice, racing toward the stones, an ofuda ready in his hand. “Keiko-chan!” Hisoka followed, watching his back, looking around the forest at...

Flames. Flames licked against the paper walls and red-lacquered wooden pillars around him. “Tsuzuki!” Hisoka called, but got no answer besides the screams. There was a crash from above, and Hisoka threw up a shield just before the beams of the ceiling crashed down on him. The air cleared enough for him to see people running away from the building. No, not from the building. He saw a shape, dim through the smoke, then suddenly absolutely clear as it moved forward. The devil roared, and Hisoka heard a more familiar scream. He jumped out of the building towards the shape in white between the devil’s feet. “Hey,” he said, shaking her shoulder. “Get up!”

The girl turned. Her hair was long and black, her outfit utterly traditional, her face a different shape, but when she said, “You!” it was Keiko.

“Come on,” Hisoka said, looking upward at the courtyard around them. The devil was growling now, bending its legs to jump. “Move!”

She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter, he’s going to get me, he’s going to kill me, I can’t stop him. It doesn’t matter, I can’t get away.”

Hisoka stood above her. “So you’re just going to let him?”

The devil leapt into the air and came crashing down towards them, its huge feet ready to crush them. Hisoka grabbed the girl’s arm and blinked out of the way. They landed about thirty feet from it, behind a standing wall which had been rubble ten minutes earlier. “Asano-san,” Hisoka said sharply, “What’s going on?”

She shook her head. “We shouldn’t have run, it doesn’t do any good. He’ll just kill more people getting to me, now. I should go back,” and the terror in those words made them almost impossible to understand. Revulsion and fear blended in her, paralyzing her, and he could hear the devil roaring over the flames. “I should go back...”

“Asano-san,” Hisoka said. “This isn’t real.” She shook, her hair cascading across her back, but didn’t answer. “You’re a school-girl from the Heisei period. This is an illusion.”

“No!” she said. “This is real. This really happened. Like this.” There was a crash, and the wall they stood behind was smashed away, stones bouncing off Hisoka’s shield to fly in all directions. She shrieked as the devil’s hands crashed down on the shield, shrieked louder when the shield started to show cracks. That shouldn’t have happened, Hisoka thought, he didn’t hit us that hard, but the cracks spread. He put more power into it, but the shield shattered as the devil pounded it, and he grabbed for her hand to blink away. She shrank away from him, and the devil’s hand came down, smashing him to the ground. He struggled to rise, but he felt the fingers around him, faster than he could react to, crushing him. He struggled for breath, felt his ribs break inwards, coughed blood, and died.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Kamakura period was from 1192-1333, about 600 years after the introduction of Buddhism to Japan. The Heisei period began in 1989.


	3. Chapter 3

“Hisoka! Hisoka!”

Hisoka groaned, struggling to open his eyes. Tsuzuki’s face came into focus, and Hisoka couldn’t tell whose relief he was feeling. For the moment, he was shaken enough not to care, just to bask in it. “Thank goodness,” Tsuzuki said. “Are you all right?”

Hisoka nodded and tried to sit up. Tsuzuki was holding him, but let go as soon as he realized it. The mountainside was back to normal, though they seemed to be in a different part. “Asano-san?”

“She’s right there,” Tsuzuki said. “And still out.” Hisoka looked over to see her on the ground a few feet from him. She was whimpering, her eyes open. “I had to take down your shield to get to you,” Tsuzuki said. “I’m sorry.”

“That was you?” He should have known the devil couldn’t have had that kind of power, but Hisoka could still feel the betrayal as his shield failed him.

Tsuzuki nodded. “You were acting possessed,” he said. “You almost teleported into a tree when you jumped.”

Hisoka glanced to the left. The tree was wide and strong, probably hundreds of years old. There had been no sign of it in the temple fire. “She’s still there,” he said. He was shivering, he realized-- practice didn’t seem to make dying any easier. This death had hurt so much more than his first.

“I know,” Tsuzuki said, worried. “I couldn’t see what was attacking you two, so I couldn’t fight it. Is it possession?”

“I’m not sure,” Hisoka said. “It looked like we'd jumped back in time. But our bodies stayed here?”

“But you weren’t hearing me,” Tsuzuki said. “Or seeing anything around you.” Keiko shrieked. Tsuzuki leapt to her side, then sat there, helpless. “Damn it!”

“Ajari-san,” Keiko said. “I won’t forgive you for this.” She shook, breath going out of her in a long death rattle.

Tsuzuki put a hand to her shoulder. “Keiko-chan!”

She blinked, and Hisoka could see her eyes focus on the here and now. “You--” she said, teeth chattering. “You just told me your name, I--”

”It’s Tsuzuki,” Hisoka said, coming into her line of sight. “You’re back?”

She nodded. “You were there!” Tears, never quite dry since he’d seen her at the devil’s feet, started to flow again. “He killed you. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“It wasn’t real,” Hisoka said firmly. “We’re here now, aren’t we?”

She nodded shakily. “But if it were real, it would be over,” she said. “But this will keep happening, again and again and again. You sh--” She sobbed, but kept trying to get the words out. “You should--”

”We’re not leaving,” Tsuzuki said. “There’s no way that we’re leaving you here with that thing by yourself. Don’t bother asking.” She shook her head. “Keiko-chan-- you won’t leave with us?”

“I can’t,” she said.

“All right,” Tsuzuki said. “Then come sit here in the sun, and have some tea.” His voice was still kind, Hisoka thought, but there was no softness to it now. “And tell us everything about what’s going on.”

Keiko hesitated, then nodded.

 

*************************************************************************

The tea Tsuzuki had poured into Hisoka’s thermos that morning was still hot. From Keiko's startled expression at the first sip, Hisoka guessed the taste hadn't changed much. “I’m sorry to put you to all this trouble,” she said. “I feel really bad about it.”

”It’s our job,” Tsuzuki said. “It’s what we’re here for. Don’t worry about it.”

“You’re onmyouji?” she asked.

“Something like that,” Tsuzuki said with a smile. He was sitting on a stone next to her, face open and ready to listen. Hisoka leaned against a tree, wondering how long it would take for the sense-memory of his ribs bending in like that to fade. “So tell us the facts of the case.”

“Well...” Keiko started slowly. “I live in Takurazuka. And I-- my life was pretty normal, you know? But I started having these dreams.” Her voice almost stayed steady, but it was an effort. “I must have had the first one a few years ago, but it was just the once. But then it happened again the next year and then a few months after that, and so on. Geometrically. It-- I dream it every night, now. I can’t sleep; it just comes.”

“What do you dream?” Tsuzuki asked. She shook her head. “Keiko-chan,” Tsuzuki said, “we can’t help unless we know what’s going on.”

Keiko lowered her face, speaking to the tea-cup in her hands. “It’s the Kamakura period, I think. And I’m in this village, on this mountain-- this one, here. And there’s a temple, and there’s a priest in the temple. And I dream that he--” The tea-cup shook, splashing hot tea on her hands. She put it down with an exclamation. Tsuzuki handed her a handkerchief, but said nothing. She dried her hands and went on, twisting the cloth between them. “He attacks me.”

There was ambiguity in her phrasing. There was none in her emotions. Hisoka knew that feeling, dirty and violated and scared and furiously helpless. “That sounds awful,” Tsuzuki said.

“It’s just a dream,” Keiko said. “But it made me angry, you know? There was nothing in my life that should have made me dream that. I don’t even know any priests.” She sounded very young, mostly because she was trying so hard to sound matter-of-fact. “I didn’t want to worry my parents by going to a psychiatrist, and, besides, I’m not crazy; I was just having this dream. So I went to see a psychic.”

Tsuzuki nodded. “What did she say?” Keiko hesitated, unsure. “It was a good idea,” he added.

Keiko went on. “She said that it was because of a past life,” she said. “That I was remembering something that happened that I was holding on to. That I had to learn how to let go of it, or I wouldn’t be able to move on.”

“That makes sense,” Tsuzuki said.

She smiled, relieved. She probably hasn’t told anyone else, Hisoka thought. I wouldn’t have. “So why did you come here?” Hisoka asked.

“Because this is where it happened,” Keiko said. “The dream was clear enough that I knew the name of the mountain. I could recognize the spot. The dreams feel... really real.” She tossed her head, flipping her hair back. “I figured I’d come here and try to relive it like it would have happened if I had been there, not my past self. I mean, she was Kamakura period. She was supposed to be modest, you know? Any guy who tried that on me wouldn’t know what hit him. One good knee to the groin, and--” She blushed, but went on, defiantly. “he wouldn’t think about touching a girl again, that’s for sure.”

Oh, Hisoka thought fiercely, it’s that easy, huh? He would have said something, but Tsuzuki felt so suddenly sad that he lost the thought. “What happened next?” Tsuzuki asked.

“Oh--” The defiance left Keiko’s face. “I took the bullet train and the commuter rail and the bus and then hiked here, um, three days ago?” Her eyes flicked to their faces, but they didn’t mention that she’d just admitted lying to them. “And I tried to, like, meditate on it. But as soon as I sat down, I was-- that other place. Where we were. Back then. And the devil was attacking me. It felt just like the dream, but I didn’t see the priest anywhere. And he keeps killing me.” She tried for a laugh. “I always thought death was a one-time thing, but no.”

Tsuzuki wasn’t laughing with her. “We’re going to stop this.” He glanced at Hisoka, checking that his partner was ready to back him up.

Hisoka wasn’t, yet. “Asano-san,” he said, “Why didn’t you just leave?”

Keiko shook her head. “The dreams would still be there,” she said. “I haven’t resolved anything. And besides, I’m not gonna let him win.” She crossed her arms. “He can’t do this to me. I won’t let him.”

There was a long pause. “Good,” Tsuzuki said, finally. “Good for you.”

Stupid, Hisoka thought. He already did it. Hisoka understood, though, better than he wanted to. “We were wrong,” he said. “It wasn’t just a ghost. It was a psychic impression.”

Tsuzuki nodded. “What happened back then was so horrible for so many people that it left their feelings in the air,” he explained to Keiko. “We stumbled onto them, and you got stuck in one.”

“But,” Keiko said, “it felt real. It felt like me.”

”It doesn’t add up,” Hisoka said. “That wouldn’t explain why Keiko felt drawn here or the skeleton I saw.” Something about that tugged at his memory, but disappeared when he tried to track it down. “There’s no connection between Keiko’s dreams and the devil. There must be more to it.”

“You’re right,” Tsuzuki said. “But that doesn’t mean there’s nothing we can do about it in the meantime.” He took Keiko’s hand, looking seriously into her eyes. “Keiko-chan, I can cast a spell on you to protect you from the impression. It will keep you from ending up back there again while we figure out what’s going on.”

“But,” Keiko said, “what about the dreams?”

Tsuzuki nodded. “If you go to sleep,” he said, “we can watch over you and see where they come from. If they’re not just memories, if they’re coming from somewhere else, then we can see where and stop it.”

She shook her head. “I can’t sleep,” she said. “I can’t-- I can’t relax enough to sleep any more.”

“Try it,” Tsuzuki coaxed. “We’ve got a sleeping bag and a bed-roll with us. Just lie down and close your eyes for a while.”

Keiko opened her mouth. “You have to lie still while we shield you against the impression, anyway,” Hisoka said.

“So why not do it somewhere comfortable?” Tsuzuki finished smoothly.

Keiko bit her lip. “If I start looking like I’m dreaming, you have to wake me up right away.”

“Of course,” Tsuzuki said. “Don’t worry about it.”

You’d think, Hisoka thought, laying a tarp out on the ground and unrolling the bedroll and sleeping bag on top of it, that he’d learn to quit saying that. Keiko knelt gracelessly on the bed, feeling ill-at-ease. The feeling eased off when Hisoka looked away and when Tsuzuki smiled at her again. “Take it easy,” he said softly. “We’re on guard, now.” A little of the constant, drumming fear Hisoka had been feeling from her ever since they met released. She sighed and pillowed her head on her arm. Tsuzuki sat back, tender and determined.

Then again, Hisoka thought, maybe this time he’ll be right. Stranger things had happened.

**************************************************************************

 

The spell was complicated enough to be worth taking their time over and quiet enough to be a soft background chant. By the time the pentacle faded, Keiko’s body had relaxed, and she was snoring softly. Tsuzuki sat down, watching her. “She’s asleep?” he whispered. Hisoka nodded. Tsuzuki sighed. “She must have been exhausted,” he said. “Poor thing.”

“I don’t feel anything trying to influence her now,” Hisoka said quietly. “If there is something attacking her, it’ll probably strike when she goes into a dream state.” Which might be a few hours. He wanted to suggest that one of them go back to the office to explain what was going on and get back-up, but that would leave the other here, with himself and the girl to look after if something happened. The clearing looked peaceful enough, the breeze gently shaking the needles of the trees, but he didn’t trust it to stay that way. He should have thought of this before she went to sleep, he thought, mentally kicking himself. How idiotic was it to let this thing with Tsuzuki distract him like this? How was he supposed to work? He shoved the thought aside. “We’ll need to follow it back.”

”And block it at the same time,” Tsuzuki said firmly. “She doesn’t need to feel that happen to her again.”

Hisoka shrugged. “That will make it more complicated,” he said. “If we cut it off from her, it may vanish. Then we won’t know anything.”

“So we’ll do both,” Tsuzuki said. “I’ll keep it off her while you follow it to the source.” He hesitated. “Are you all right with that?”

“Why not?” Hisoka said. “But if I synch with the sending, I’ll only dream her dream. That won’t help.”

“No, of course not,” Tsuzuki said. “I don’t mean you should do that.” He felt even more repulsed by the idea than Hisoka had. “Can you synch with the sender?”

“I should be able to,” Hisoka said. “I’ll have to go deep into it, though.” It would make it hard to keep track of himself and hard to come out of it if something unexpected happened. The whole thing seemed ridiculously complicated, and for a moment the thought flashed through his head: I’m on vacation. I don’t have to do any of this. Let someone else handle it.

“Not too deep,” Tsuzuki said. “Just enough to find out what’s doing this and come back. I’ll tether you.”

Hisoka frowned. “You’d have to be reading my mind.”

“Right,” Tsuzuki said, slightly confused. “I think we’re getting better at that.”

I don’t want you to get any better at that. Not right now. “I don’t think it’s necessary. I’ll just stay alert.”

“Stay alert?” Tsuzuki looked dubious. “That won’t be enough. You don’t know what kind of thing we’re dealing with or what kind of power it might have.” He looked down at Keiko’s sleeping face. “It was strong enough to find her all the way in Takurazuka. I don’t want to take any chances with it.”

“But,” Hisoka said. “You-- you’ll have a hard time shielding her from the dreams and keeping track of me at the same time.” Except that he wouldn’t. Neither task would take that much concentration, and both were very necessary. Hisoka, used to being the practical one in the partnership, squirmed. How am I supposed to work with him if I don’t trust him? Don’t I trust him?

Tsuzuki felt like he was wondering the same thing. “How will you protect yourself if I don’t? You won’t be able to synch if you’re shielded.”

“I won’t synch with it deeply,” Hisoka argued. “I’ll just go and come back. I won’t be gone long enough to run into trouble.”

“How long do you think trouble takes?” Tsuzuki asked, confused by Hisoka’s objections. “You know what kind of risks there are. Why won’t you--” He cut himself off, bitter realization seeping through him.

Hisoka looked away, hating the feelings in Tsuzuki, hating that Tsuzuki had shown up to put him in this position to begin with. “It doesn’t matter,” he said. “Asano-san’s the one who needs help, not me.”

“Fine,” Tsuzuki said. He felt bitterly confused, again, and was growing frustrated with it. “I’ll watch over her. But if it looks like you’re in trouble, I’m going to shake you out of it.” Hisoka nodded. “That is what I’m here for. To watch your back.”

“I know,” Hisoka said. I do know that. I just...

They said nothing else until the dreams started to come.

 

*************************************************************************

 

Hisoka noticed it first. “Tsuzuki-- now!”

Tsuzuki, who had been staring unhappily into the woods, snapped into action, an ofuda in hand. “I’ve got the shield. Go!”

Hisoka closed his eyes, concentrating. The dream came on a cloud of malevolence, pushing, ready to pour into Keiko and overflow. He could feel the shape of the mind behind it, though, and it didn’t seem far away. It seemed as close as the stones around them. Hisoka took a firm mental grasp of reality and plunged into the stream of consciousness flowing toward Keiko and crashing against Tsuzuki’s shield. There. Now. Go.

And he was gone. The space around him was dark, the dimness of a crescent-moon night, without the glow of cities on the horizon. He was in a well-swept courtyard with ornamental trees and stones arranged around him. The harmonies felt off, though. Possibly because of the man standing in front of him.

The priest was taller than Hisoka, but not actually that large-- shorter than Tsuzuki, certainly. His head was shaven, and he wore a priest’s robes but not a priest’s calm. He drew back when he saw Hisoka, his face dim in the shadows. “Where is she?” he demanded.

“What do you want with her?” Hisoka asked, ready to fight or fly. He’d used the rudest possible form of the word ‘you,’ he realized. It had felt right.

“None of your concern,” the priest said. “It has nothing to do with anyone but she and I. It’s between us.” He crossed his arms, looking official. “You can just get out of here.”

He felt... sweaty, Hisoka thought. And overpowering. Most people contain their emotions at least a little bit, keeping them to themselves. But this man was perfectly willing for his feelings to spill over, to let them overrun him, to let them overrun anyone who might be around him. Hisoka had felt this before, lust and power all mixed together, ready to strike out and seize. He shivered. He’d seen enough, he thought, he should leave now, but he couldn’t leave that feeling unchallenged. “She wants nothing to do with you,” he said. “Leave her alone.”

“She’s mine,” the priest said. “I’ve wanted her for so long, and now I have her. Every night, I have her.” He stepped forward, moonlight silvering his scowl. “I’ve been so patient. You have no business telling me now that I can’t have her.”

“She doesn’t want you,” Hisoka snapped. He was breathing fast, feeling the man coming toward him more strongly with every pulse of his blood.

“It doesn’t matter,” the man said. Hisoka could feel his lust, his gleeful anticipation. “I’ve had her, now. No-one else could want her. So I can have her. I can have her as often as I like. It’s my right.”

“No,” Hisoka said. His feelings were too strong, were all around them, echoing through the courtyard. Hisoka found himself fighting, feeling overwhelmed. I should have let Tsuzuki tether me, he thought. Damn. I need to find my way out, I need to feel something other than him, but it’s like he’s everywhere. “What the hell makes you think that that’s your right, asshole? What about her rights?”

“That doesn’t matter any more,” the man said. “Besides, she knows what she’s for. She must. She keeps coming back.” Hisoka was gasping now because he could feel the man, could feel the memories, and he couldn’t block them out. “Over and over,” the man said, and Hisoka could feel Keiko’s mouth under his own, bruising hard, the softness of her breasts, the way her thighs parted when he shoved his way between them. “Again and again. She’s mine.” Hisoka gagged, trapped in the sound of her voice when she sobbed and the feeling of pleasure when she shrieked at a particularly hard thrust, and he wanted to throw up, and he wanted to get away, and this was wrong, this was wrong, this was more wrong than anything he’d known because he was enjoying it. He was feeling the man’s enjoyment of her, her fear and her body, and he couldn’t tell where the man stopped and he started. He screamed. “NO!”

“Mine,” the man said, and Hisoka wanted, just as much as he did, to hold her down, to bury his hands in her hair and feel her struggling against him. “I never knew I could feel this strong, this virile. I never knew I could enjoy my body so much. I cut myself off from it; for years, for hundreds and hundreds of years, I denied it. For my whole life, I tried to pretend that it wasn’t there, that it didn’t call me.” He felt hard and urgent and alive in his lust, in his wanting. “Now I know. Now I understand.” He laughed. “Who could tell me to give this up? I gave it up once. Never again. No matter what they say, no matter what the gods do.” He laughed again. “I will feel this forever!”

Hisoka opened his eyes and did not see the man in front of him in the courtyard. He saw nothing at all. Of course-- the courtyard was the man, as much a projection of his mind as the image of him had been. But what Hisoka saw mattered much less than what he felt strumming through every cell of him. He wanted her again. Hard and rough and fast, until he’d had enough of her. She was all he wanted, and nothing else would satisfy.

Fortunately, he knew just where to find her.

 

*************************************************************************

Tsuzuki caught his partner as Hisoka slumped, going from trance right into dream. Keiko’s eyes twitched behind her eyelids in her own dreams, but her face was relaxed, at ease. Good, Tsuzuki thought. I’m sure she needs the sleep. It’s hard enough to be scared, but exhausted and scared at once is ten times worse.

He checked the shield over Keiko to make sure there were no cracks or weaknesses in it. Finding none, he carefully leaned Hisoka against his pack and took off his trenchcoat to lay it over him. There, he thought, and sat down to watch them both. Hisoka’s face was serious, focused, even when his consciousness wasn’t behind it. Tsuzuki smiled. Just like him, isn’t it? It seemed like he spent a lot of time watching Hisoka sleep. There was something about watching over him that eased the heart just in the simple actionless action. It felt almost peaceful.

Tsuzuki crouched between the two of them, rocking back on his heels. Too bad it can’t stay like that, he thought. I’m making him nervous, lately. I shouldn’t have asked so much of him. I should have known better than that. After Muraki, I’m surprised he lets people touch him at all. It’s amazing that he let me as close as he did. What’s wrong with me that I couldn’t just leave it at that? He sighed and checked the shield again, running a hand over the invisible boundary surrounding Keiko. Fine. Quiet. I should let it stay that way, Tsuzuki thought. Try to forget I ever said anything and hope he can do the same. I should have left it at friendship. That was more than enough. Just because I wanted to see something more from him doesn’t mean there was something there.

Except. Except that, despite everything they said, he couldn’t forget how Hisoka had held him in the fire. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had held him like that, like half Hisoka’s life was inside his chest, like the younger man was trying with all his strength to join the halves into a whole. Like he needed Tsuzuki to live. I can’t say I deserve for you to love me, he thought, or that I have any right to expect it. But then... what was that?

Nothing to do with right now, Tsuzuki thought firmly. For one thing, he couldn’t afford to be distracted while he had the two of them to watch over. For another, there was simply nothing he could do about it unless Hisoka decided to. He wouldn’t push, not if it would scare him. He didn’t have to be that much of a scum. Partners, he thought. And as his partner, I’m going to keep him from running into any trouble while he jaunts around the astral plane by himself because he doesn’t want me inside his mind any more. Tsuzuki sighed. Partners.

Keiko stirred, murmuring. “Oh...” she said, opening her eyes. She looked up at Tsuzuki.

“Better?” Tsuzuki asked. Some of the tension had left her face, and he was glad to see it go. She didn’t have that haggard bombing-victim look any more, and he could see the youth starting to shine again. Good, he thought.

She sat up. “No dreams,” she said wonderingly. She rubbed her eyes. “How long was I asleep?”

“A few hours,” Tsuzuki said. He gestured at his partner, who was still slumped against the pack. “Hisoka’s gone to find out what he can about whatever was sending them to you.” He checked his watch. “He should be about done. I’ll wake him up.”

“Nmm,” Keiko said.

Tsuzuki turned back to her, all attention. “Mm?”

Keiko brushed her hair back from her face. “I just... I feel bad about it. He keeps getting in the way for me, you know? Like, none of this is his fault. He shouldn’t have to, to suffer for it.”

”Keiko-chan,” Tsuzuki said seriously. “Neither should you.” He caught her eye and held it. “You never did anything to deserve it.”

”I know!” she said. “Well, I mean... I didn’t do anything.” She pushed the sleeping bag away from her legs, trying to smooth down a rip in her skirt. “But she... when I dream? I feel like I did.”

No, Tsuzuki thought. You’re too young to have to deal with that. “Why?”

“Because she did,” Keiko said. “My past self. In the dream. She’d known him a little bit, before he... attacked her. She used to smile at him when he passed. So when he, when he did that, I kept thinking I shouldn’t have been so forward. I shouldn’t have encouraged him, I knew what men are like.”

“Keiko-chan,” Tsuzuki said, “men aren’t.” He wanted to make her understand this. It mattered. “I would never do that. No matter how much I wanted someone. Just because I’d be able to, that doesn’t make it all right.” His hands were clasped in his lap so tightly they hurt. “Anyone who’d do that-- there’s something wrong with him. Not you.” Because I do not believe that you ever did anything in your life to hurt anyone, not really. And you must not go on feeling guilty about this.

“I know,” Keiko said. “It’s totally what she was thinking, you know? Not what I was. It’s hard to keep that separate sometimes, but... yeah. Obviously.” She smiled at him. “Don’t worry about it.”

Tsuzuki blinked. “Okay,” he said, not quite sure what to make of that confident assurance. Either a really good mask or not a mask at all, and he couldn’t quite make sense of either. He smiled back and went to shake Hisoka’s shoulder. “Hisoka. Come back. Wake up.”

Hisoka opened his eyes, and there was something odd about it. It’s that he didn’t flinch, Tsuzuki thought, wincing inside. When did that become normal for him again? “Tsuzuki,” Hisoka said, sitting up and handing Tsuzuki his trench-coat. “Did it work?”

Tsuzuki nodded. “She was fine.” Keiko smiled agreement. “What did you find?”

Hisoka rubbed his forehead. “A fairy-tale,” he said. “I had thought this seemed familiar, but I couldn’t remember the details.” He stretched out a crick in his neck. “Is there any of that tea left?”

“Sure.” Tsuzuki poured the last contents of the thermos into a cup and handed it over.

Hisoka inhaled the scent deeply, then drank. “I read this story a long time ago,” he said. “But I had to see it to know the truth.”

Tsuzuki sat forward. There was something odd here, and he wondered if Hisoka had really come back so easily. He seemed all right, but... “So?”

“So,” Hisoka said. “A very long time ago, there was a priest named Ajari Joan. He lived in a monastary built on this spot right here ever since he was a very small boy, and he wanted only to serve God and find enlightenment. But one day, he saw a beautiful girl. She was so beautiful that she was all he could think about.” Hisoka’s voice had taken on a story-teller’s cadence, and Tsuzuki listened, entranced. He hadn’t known his partner could do this. He sounded completely different than normal. That is-- Tsuzuki blinked, then tried to keep his face still and listen. “In prayer or at meals, at work or in bed at night, he could think of nothing but her. He was obsessed. Finally, there was nothing he could do but go to her one night, in the dark of the new moon.

“Now, the gods saw this, and they were angry that he broke his vows.” Keiko hissed under her breath. Hisoka went on, unnoticing. “So they punished him by turning him into a huge devil. The devil rampaged, roaring in fury. It set fire to the monastary, and it killed all the priests and all the villagers, and still its fury did not abate.

“But Ajari Joan saw what he had done, and he regretted that he had broken his vows to God. So he made a supreme act of will, and he repented. In that moment, he was transformed back into his normal body, and he sat down immediately to pray. He prayed as hard as he could, trying to subdue the lust that had made him act this way, doing nothing but pray. He prayed so hard and so long that he starved and wasted away, and still he went on praying so that he turned into a skeleton who can still be seen on this very mountain, chanting, with prayer beads in its bony hands.”

Tsuzuki whistled. “That explains it,” he said, watching Hisoka carefully. “But if this Ajari repented, then why is he still after Keiko-chan?”

Hisoka didn’t hesitate. “Because he hadn’t seen her again when he repented,” he said. “He hadn’t known she reincarnated until he felt her two years ago. Then he remembered what it was he’d been struggling to repent from all this time.” He shrugged, and there was something odd about his tone. “Looks like he changed his mind.”

Keiko muttered something that Tsuzuki wouldn’t have thought a schoolgirl would say in public. “And decided to drag me into it?”

“He didn’t see any difference,” Hisoka said easily. Keiko flushed.

Tsuzuki frowned. That’s not like him, he thought. It’s not that he wouldn’t say something like that, but he wouldn’t say it that way. Tsuzuki remembered black wings and shivered inside. Unless he didn’t. Unless it wasn’t him saying that at all. No... “Just like how Hijiri got dragged in,” he said thoughtfully, watching Hisoka’s face, “when Kazusa got his father’s eye.”

Hisoka blinked at him. “When Hijiri got her father’s eye, you mean?” he asked, sounding puzzled. “How is that anything like this?”

“Um,” Tsuzuki said, flustered but mostly relieved. “Well, it seemed like one of the more interesting reincarnation cases we’ve handled.”

”Reincarnation cases?” Hisoka was giving him that look, the one that said ‘I don’t know how you manage to find your way out of bed in the morning.’ It was utterly appalled that anyone could say something that stupid, and it was absolutely pure Hisoka.

All right, Tsuzuki thought. I was wrong. That is him. I’m being paranoid. He breathed a sigh of relief and went back to the business at hand. “Anyway, now we know. The first thing is to get Keiko-chan away.” He checked with her. “If we can block the dreams, will you be okay?”

”I guess,” Keiko said. “I mean, it’s not like I can change what happened back then. But... you’ll do something about him?”

Tsuzuki nodded. “The dead have no business bothering the living,” he said. “We’ll find a way to make Ajari Joan move on to whatever afterlife he belongs in. It would be a good idea to take Keiko-chan back to Meifu, though, until we’ve finished. It’s our headquarters-- you’ll be safer there,” he said. She stood up, ready to go. Tsuzuki rolled up the bed-roll and handed it to Hisoka. “Ready?”

“I’ll take Keiko,” Hisoka offered. He stood, the pack in one hand, looking perfectly at ease.

That... Tsuzuki thought. There's still something wrong with that. “Are you sure?”

“Of course,” Hisoka said. “Come on, we’re wasting time.” He took Keiko’s hand and disappeared.

That sounded natural enough. But... Uncertain, Tsuzuki also blinked out, heading Meifu-wards.

The clearing was still for a moment. Then Hisoka and Keiko reappeared. Hisoka dropped the pack, but kept hold of her hand. “Finally,” he said. “I thought he’d never leave.” He smiled at her, an expression that held nothing for her, just gloating for him. “Keiko-chan.”


	4. Chapter 4

Keiko tried to pull her hand away. “Kurosaki-san?”

Hisoka didn’t let her. “Yes?”

“I thought we were going back to your headquarters,” she said. “You’re hurting my hand.” She was starting to be scared again, and he could feel it, and he liked knowing he could make her feel that way. He could always make her feel that way. There was something he was forgetting, he thought, something teasing at the back of his mind. He had other things to think about at the moment. “Let go.”

“Hush,” Hisoka said, tightening his grip until he could feel the bones hard against his hand. “Don’t make a fuss.”

Her face changed, losing any attempt at polite decorum. “Let go of me!”

He felt her fear. It was strong enough that it should have knocked him out, but the emotions he sensed seemed duller somehow, as if the pleasure he felt served as armor. “Quiet,” he said, pulling her toward him. “I won’t take long. I just need to feel you again.”

She swore. “Get off!”

Her blouse was torn already, he saw. She looked ridiculously enticing in these clothes, in this body. She was already half naked-- he could see most of her legs. Stripping her would hardly be a challenge. The thing he was forgetting tugged at him again. “Calm down,” he said, reaching for the top of her shirt.

She punched him hard enough that he saw stars, hard enough that he almost let go of her hand. He staggered, pulling her toward him and striking her hard across the face. “You--!”

She kicked out and got him in the thigh hard enough to make him yell again. She hit him again and again with her free hand, crying, screaming “No!” He winced at a particularly hard strike, and she jerked her hand free. He punched her again, knocking her to the ground. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

“Hisoka!” Hisoka dodged backwards, thrown by the sudden appearance of the shinigami in front of him. Tsuzuki’s shock was almost as sharp as his fury. “What are you doing?”

Hisoka glared up at him. “Get out of the way.”

“Tsuzuki-san!” Keiko was behind him, her good hand cradling her wrist. “It’s him! It’s not him, it’s-- he got him!”

Tsuzuki didn’t take his eyes off Hisoka. “Ajari Joan,” he spat.

Hisoka paused. That was his name. Except, of course, that it wasn’t. He stepped back, looking up at the much larger man in front of him. “Go,” he said.

“Ajari,” Tsuzuki growled, and his anger felt like a coat of flames around him, “get out of him. Now.”

He’d have to be careful, Hisoka thought. The shinigami was powerful, much more powerful than he. He could have howled in frustration, too, because she was right there behind him looking so delicious, flushed and panting, eyes wide... He was forgetting something, he thought again, more urgently. “This has nothing to do with you,” he said. “I don’t care what the gods you work for say anymore. I want her.”

An ofuda appeared in Tsuzuki’s hand, and he was summoning, getting ready to cast. Hisoka lunged forward and grabbed his hand, tearing the ofuda away. “I won’t let you deny me this,” he spat. “Not after this long. Why should I give up what makes me happy when nothing else does?”

Tsuzuki grabbed him hard around the shoulders, trapping his arms against his body. “What about her happiness?” he growled, his anger beating hard around them. “What about Hisoka’s?”

“What about it?” Hisoka struggled, managed to dig a fist into the shinigami’s gut. Tsuzuki grunted, but didn’t let go. “It’s her or me. I’m sick of denying myself.”

“Bastard!” Tsuzuki’s arms slackened just slightly in his disgust. “Just because you’re sick of going without, you think that’s a reason to rape someone?”

Hisoka shuffled his feet, trying to get a better position. “I’m not going back to that frustration. I don’t care about what I have to do for it.”

“Asshole,” Tsuzuki growled, “you could ask.”

Hisoka stopped moving. “What?”

Tsuzuki panted, not trying to get a better position, just holding on. “You don’t just take. Not against someone’s will. That’s unforgivable.” He felt a little hopeful, reaching out. “If a person chooses you back, it’s different.”

Hisoka shook. “Bullshit! Who are you to talk-- you’ve been after me for weeks!” He twisted sharply, throwing the bigger man over his shoulder to crash hard against the ground. “You fucking hypocrite!”

Tsuzuki gasped, stunned. “Hisoka...”

Hisoka laughed. “Don’t pretend you’re better than me,” he said. “I held myself back for my whole life except that once. You couldn’t wait one day before you were trying to get me in your bed!”

Tsuzuki rolled onto his side, leaning his weight on his arm, starting to rise. “Hisoka,” he said, his eyes brimming but intent. “Do you really think I would do that to you?” He rose, slowly, until he was kneeling at Hisoka’s feet. “I know you can feel that I love you, and I’m sorry, I wish I could keep that from bothering you.” His voice shook. “But do you really think that I’d hurt you? Ever?”

“But,” Hisoka said. “But you want me. Like I want her.” He gestured to Keiko, who was curled up around her hand, eyes wide.

“No,” Tsuzuki said sharply. “You,” he hesitated, “you want to own her. To make her your toy. I don’t want to own you like that, Hisoka.” Hisoka didn’t remember ever looking into Tsuzuki’s eyes for this long before. They held him. “I-- I’ve been wanting to be yours.”

Hisoka staggered. “I,” he said. “That is...” He laughed, suddenly seeing through it. “That’s fine for you, shinigami,” he said, and something felt wrong, but he didn’t know what. “But I don’t like men. Too bad.”

Tsuzuki’s head shot up. “Ajari,” he said, and his eyes looked like purple flames. “I won’t forgive you for this.”

Something felt very wrong, sickeningly wrong. Hisoka tried to shrug it off. “Don’t get in my way,” he spat, fighting to keep his balance.

“Let him go,” Tsuzuki said. “You have no right to him. Let him go!”

Wrong, the feeling of wrongness grew, overwhelming him, battering through his dissolving sense of pleasure. Hisoka stretched upwards, feeling his limbs thicken, his hair grow, the horns sprout from his head. “Mine!” he roared. “I--” No, something was not right. “I’ll kill you!”

Tsuzuki leapt at him from the ground, his arms going around Hisoka’s neck, riding upwards as Hisoka’s body grew. Hisoka saw a casting circle starting to form bright around him, and why on earth should that have made him feel hope? He batted at the man hanging from his neck, his foot-long claws cutting deeply into the shinigami’s back, but there was no difference in the pressure of arms holding him. “No!”

There was a scream at his feet. Hisoka looked down, seeing the girl staring up at him from the ground. He raised his arm, and the feeling of wrongness almost paralyzed him. Tsuzuki swung his weight to the side, throwing off Hisoka’s balance so that he spun around away from her. Furious, he tried to crush the shinigami, but his hands would not move, would not obey him. No, he thought, and something deep inside said, yes.

“Hisoka!” Tsuzuki called. “You know who you are. You don’t have to let him do this. Come out!” His voice was commanding. It sounded like the summons for a god. “Hisoka!”

Hisoka screamed. “I won’t let you! Mine! Mine! Mi--” He shuddered, and something rippled through him. “Mine,” he said. His body lost its bulk. The excess flesh melted off him, the snarl smoothed from his face. These were his hands, with no claws, no hair hanging off the back of them-- his hands again, strong and white and pressing against Tsuzuki, who was again taller than he was. Tsuzuki fell away, his back a mass of blood.

There was a clattering at Hisoka’s feet. The skeleton was clutching his ankles, desperately trying to hang on. “Mine,” the skeleton rasped, its voice as shattered as the ruin around them. “Mine.”

Hisoka screamed, casting a spell he hadn’t known he knew. “Begone! Take yourself out of the world to the place you belong!”

The skeleton skittered away from him, reaching for Keiko. “Mine...” She snarled and brought a fallen stone crashing down on its skull. The skull shattered, its empty grin hanging disconnected above its spine, but it kept coming. Hisoka poured power into the spell, speaking the words of it again and again. “Go to hell!”

Light flashed around them. For one moment the priest, bitter and denied, stood backlit before he vanished in the sheet of light. “Go,” Hisoka gasped, and then it was gone, and the pentacle he’d cast was fading away. Hisoka stared down at the place where it had been, flexing his hands. Mine, he thought, feeling the muscles move at his command, his own skin touching as he would have it touch. Keiko fell to the ground, crying with relief. I got him, Hisoka thought. We got him-- “Tsuzuki!”

Hisoka dropped to his knees beside his partner, who lay curled up on his side. That's too much blood, Hisoka thought, I didn’t know I cut him so deeply. There were bones poking through the flesh. “Tsuzuki!”

Tsuzuki opened his eyes, his face grey. “Hisoka?”

Hisoka grabbed his hand. “What did you do that for? Look at you!”

”Hisoka,” Tsuzuki breathed, smiling.

“Tsuzuki... Lie still.” Hisoka leaned over to press his hands to his partner’s back, trying to push the wound closed and staunch the blood. “I’m sorry.”

Tsuzuki hissed a breath, but didn’t pull away from Hisoka’s hands. “It wasn’t you.”

Hisoka bent his head over Tsuzuki’s back. “It was, though,” he said. “It wasn’t just me-- it was him, too. That bastard.” He could feel Tsuzuki’s skin starting to move underneath his hands, his body starting to repair itself. “But I meant what I said, too.”

Tsuzuki said nothing, just winced as his flesh reknit.

“But you held on,” Hisoka said. “You brought me back to myself.” There was a layer of skin over Tsuzuki’s back now, so he didn’t have to keep holding him, but he still pressed his hands against Tsuzuki, leaning forward to rest his forehead against Tsuzuki’s shoulder. “Thank you.”

Tsuzuki hesitated. Then he put his arms around Hisoka, and it felt like coming home. “Any time,” Tsuzuki said. “Always.”

There was a cough. “Um,” Keiko said, blushing faintly, “could we get off the mountain now?”

 

*************************************************************************

It seemed less complicated to blink Keiko home than it would have been to try to send her back, as she didn’t look like she was in any state to take the train. She sighed, looking up at her front door. “My parents are going to kill me.”

Hisoka and Tsuzuki, both feeling drained, gave each other a look. “We could try to explain it to them for you...” Tsuzuki offered.

Keiko shook her head quickly. “No. Thanks, but... no. I think I’ll just struggle through on my own.” She stepped back, starting to move towards saying goodbye. “Well, I... thank you.” She bowed. “I think you saved my life. A bunch of times. And that’s-- well, I owe you.”

“It’s our job,” Tsuzuki said. “I’m just glad you’re all right.” He beamed at her, and Hisoka couldn’t quite believe how joyful his partner felt just to see her standing safe and sound.

“Asano-san,” Hisoka said, “I should apologize.” He wasn’t sure how, though. He didn’t see how any apology would be enough.

“What for?” She still felt uncomfortable, Hisoka thought, and shaken, scared, and exhausted, but she didn’t flinch from him. “You didn’t do anything to me, remember? Not after I hit you.”

Hisoka blinked. “But still--”

She shook her head. “No way. You helped me so much. And besides-- we beat him.” There was a new pride there, still unfamiliar around the edges, but growing inside her. “You, mostly. But I smashed his skull in.” She grinned fiercely. “Bastard.”

”Good for you,” Tsuzuki said with a touch of pride of his own. “Well done, Keiko-chan.”

She ran a hand through her hair. “It’s over. I can’t believe it’s over.”

“It is,” Tsuzuki said firmly. “And just in case, we’ll be watching. You don’t have to worry any more.”

”Thank-you,” Keiko said. “So much. Thank you.” She edged toward her door again. “Well, um, good luck, with,” she did not meet their eyes, “whatever. You two.” She was blushing. “Yeah.”

Tsuzuki smiled gently. “Thank-you, Keiko-chan.” He smiled at his partner. “Come on, Hisoka.”

“Right,” Hisoka said. Tsuzuki turned away. Hisoka looked at Keiko. “Thanks,” he said. She bowed one last time and went into the house.

“So,” Tsuzuki said. “We should go back to Meifu. We have lots of reports to file on this.” He sighed. “Not much of a vacation, huh?”

”Tsuzuki,” Hisoka said. Tsuzuki, who hadn’t been fooling either of them for a minute, caught his eye. “I need to think,” Hisoka said. “About what you said. I need to take the time to figure it out.”

“Right,” Tsuzuki said. “Of course.”

The uncertainty hovered in Tsuzuki’s emotions again, and Hisoka did not like it. Whatever’s going on with me, he thought, I don’t see any reason to make you feel like that. It’s not just me here. That was an odd insight, and it was going to take getting used to. It’s not just me or you, or me versus you. It’s us. Which makes no sense at all, and I don’t know how it’s going to. Weird. But worth a try. “Hey,” he said. “You want to go get something to eat?”

Tsuzuki lit up inside, warm as a hearthfire. “Yeah,” he said. “Hmmm... what’s good in Takarazuka? They have hachikazuki-chan-- you know, with the sweet potatoes...?”

Hisoka sighed. “Trust you to know that,” he said, but it wasn’t what he felt like saying. He didn’t know how to say what he meant just now. He’d have to work on that. “Come on,” he said, and Tsuzuki followed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Japanese has a number of different words meaning “you” of varying levels of politeness. Hisoka called Ajari Joan kisama, which is usually translated as “you bastard!”
> 
> The story of Ajari Joan and Hokkatsu-san is a real Japanese folk tale, much as Hisoka told it. “Hakkatsu-san” literally means “Skeleton Mountain,” but I couldn’t find out whether it’s a real mountain or not. The girl’s reincarnation isn’t part of the original story, just as her name isn’t. They seemed worth adding.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to my beta readers, AngstnoKami, Rush-That-Speaks, Weirdquark, Signy, and Sei Shonagon! All knowledge of the manga is theirs, all mistakes are mine.


End file.
